Growing my own: Chloemobile's Micro Cab

Chloemobile · Oct 21, 2015

Hello friends!

I'm back

this cab should look familiar to some but I am going to try to push it to its limits this time.

Dimensions: 11"x11"x29" 5 dollar thrift store special.

Light:150w HPS

Ventilation/ Odor control: 195 CFM centrifugal fan with a retail carbon scrubber. Both in the attic.

Intake:1"X11" slot on the bottom of the cab which is louvered to prevent light from escaping. 4" hole in the top of the cab directly above the light getting great airflow for my cab.

Container:2 gallon air pot trimmed down a few inches to allow for a bit of extra grow room and height control. The diameter of the pot fits my cab perfectly though.

Medium: organic soil mix of - Compost, EWC, Peat, hydroton(prefer it over perlite) Dr.Earth Bud and Bloom organic Dry ferts and a little bit of Bio-tone.

Fert schedule:Water Only.

Strains:Arjans Haze #1 or CH9 Ultra Haze as a backup.

MicroRoy · Oct 21, 2015

Good Luck. Here to follow.

Chloemobile · Oct 22, 2015

MicroRoy: Glad to have you along!!

Some new Happenings

Added two 23W 6500k CFL's to mix the spectrum up a bit...also added a PC fan blowing on the lights to help out with the extra light.

I had a CH9 Climax Auto Freebie that i thought died as a seedling from stem-rot/dampening-off.

Once it broke gound it just stopped growing..so i did some investigation and the tap root was not very long and didnt look healthy(kinda shriveled up)...I about tossed it but instead just put the root/stem inside of a wet papertowel with one of my seeds that i was germinating and low and behold it started growing after a day..well i wasnt sure but left it in the paper towel for a second day there was visible changes!!! so it was not dead after all...pleasant surprise. I put it in a 1.5 liter water bottle cut just above half. it fits right in a corner of the cab along with the airpot.

Checked the beans...The Arjan's Haze #1 has not popped yet..dormant or bad.

The CH9 Ultra Haze on the other hand had cracked and just the tip of the tap root was coming out...so it should be ready for potting up tomorrow. I was reading up on the linage of this and am really excited. Super Silver haze is one of my favorite smokes of all time and this strain is Shantibaba SSH x Jack33 which CH9 likes to use in a lot of their crosses.

Some pics:

blynx · Oct 25, 2015

Looking forward to seeing this run! That's a lotta light in a small area.

Chloemobile · Oct 25, 2015

Blynx: Thank you sir!! Trying to get the most of this space since this is it. hopefully get some Blynx like consistency going on too!

The should be the last addition to this cab, but because I travel occasionally I needed away to water while away. Have seen blumats and people love them once they get dialed in but have also seen some disasters. I opted for something with a little more control and already had most of the parts available.

Small water pump and some adjustable dripper steaks in a timer. Right now they are at the lowest setting and doing a drip every 2-3 seconds. I'll leave the timer on for 30 minutes a day which should be fine. Once I get a digital timer I'll open them up a bit more and only run it for a minute every other day or something.

The Super Haze popped it's head above ground and the Climax Auto is chugging along now.

Cinderella Man · Oct 25, 2015

Looks interesting for sure... lets see what 150W per sqft will do eh

Chloemobile · Oct 31, 2015

Cinderella Man:Thank you! I think this will be interesting too.

Just a little update. Automatic watering seemed to work....everything looks good after a week away

Dion · Nov 4, 2015

cool

i suggest you look at blumat not blumat topf

http://www.blumat-shop.de/Blumat/

Chloemobile · Nov 6, 2015

Dion: That may not be a bad idea. Less hassle then the timer/pump setup and seems less prone to empty the entire res into the grow area than the tropf version. I noticed they have bottle adapters too which may be good for my out of town needs and at worst it empties a bottle full instead of a bucket full. Cheap enough that I have no excuse to not give it a shot

. the only advantage I see at this point in my current setup is that the dripped steaks are small and don't take up much room in the soil. It appears the blumats need a bit more space in the soil. Not a deal breaker,, but something to consider.

Chloemobile · Nov 7, 2015

Another week of growth. Everyone looking happy.

Grow_engineer · Nov 11, 2015

Hey,

nice setup. I have a question: As i saw you already used cfls then (?) LEDs and now HDI is it just something new or a real evolution/inprovement over the other?

Why I ask is:
I am thinkin´about the perfect 1 (perhaps 1.5) sqft cab for a while now:

topdown 1.5sqft growbox

was thougt to use a coolshade with either 150W HCI or

...200W PLL (fluros)

vertical with fluros 5x 24W T5

even possible with 2x70W HCI (kind of HDI)

I hope to get managed to all running projects and family business till the end of the year to start up with a microbox.

greetings from Germany

Chloemobile · Nov 12, 2015

Hello!!! Happy to provide my input! I have gotten great results with all three lights.

If you have the ability to vent and cool an HID bulb and energy consumption isn't a factor then definitely go with the HID. The results are tried and true and growers have been growing with them for many many years. If energy efficiency and heat ventilation become more important than it is more prudent to use PLL or LED. I LOve growing with vertical PLL. you can get the entire plant next to the bulb and buds from top to bottom are full and large with 0 "larf" (fluffy under developed flowers due to not recurring enough light). With LEDS you enjoy the benefit of super efficient easy to cool light that is very intense so it compares well to HID lighting.

so, to wrap up it really depends on your constraints. If there are none I recommend HID. If heat is a factor I would go with the vertical PLL design. If heat and or energy efficient are your primary concerns then go with LED.

one constraint I did forget to mention was that concerning monetary resources. LED's have made recent strides in affordability but are still basically on par with or a little more expensive than HID. CFL's are the least expensive and easier to obtain and use.

I'm sure some of this you realized yourself , but just wanted to provide a verbose answer incase other people have similar/related experiences,thoughts or questions. And I'm high as a kite and am really enjoying typing for some reason right now.

Chloemobile · Nov 13, 2015

The Climax Auto started showing pistils today. Super Haze is chugging along.
going to call this Flower Day: 1 for the auto. I am going to wait one more week to switch the lights to 12/12 for the haze.

Chloemobile · Nov 19, 2015

This auto is fast. Wish it would have grown a little bigger but then again it's not a very big container.

Weve been under 12/12 for about 7 days now.

Chloemobile · Nov 26, 2015

Decided to change the lighting to LED to see first hand what the whites look like from the off the shelf bulbs. The light looks bright but it's hard for me to say if it's brighter than the 150 Hps. I am leaning towards yes though. The bases still get very hot. Too hot to touch for longer than a second. I originally had the lights lower to the canopy using a chiain and hooks but temps quickly spiked to 100. I had to move them as close to the extraction hole as possible which seemed to help. I'll have to move the plants closer to the lights rather than vice versa.

Chloemobile · Nov 26, 2015

Also began to build a mom cab.

Found this at the hardware store. Looks a lot like a sandwhich style scrubber that I have built based on a design from blynx.

I decided to just attach a frame to it and then skin the frame.

Just need to do the part I hate and suck at the most......the door.

blynx · Nov 26, 2015

Chloemobile said:
Decided to change the lighting to LED to see first hand what the whites look like from the off the shelf bulbs. The light looks bright but it's hard for me to say if it's brighter than the 150 Hps. I am leaning towards yes though. The bases still get very hot. Too hot to touch for longer than a second. I originally had the lights lower to the canopy using a chiain and hooks but temps quickly spiked to 100. I had to move them as close to the extraction hole as possible which seemed to help. I'll have to move the plants closer to the lights rather than vice versa.

View Image View Image View Image View Image

Cool! Looking forward to seeing how this turns out.

What wattage are those LEDs?

When it comes to LEDs, what I'm aiming for is a lot lower wattage from what I've been running, while producing a similar yield.

I don't see a benefit of replacing 115w of CFLs in my 11" x 11" cab with equivalent or even near equivalent wattage LEDs unless it is going to really increase the yield over the 115w of CFL.

I don't think that is going to happen, so I chose to lower the wattage a lot while trying to maintain similar yield.

That's why I went all the way down to 30w of LEDs. Over all my runs in the 11" X 11" cab the avg yield has been like 33grams. If I get anything over 30 grams I'll be happy. My wattage would be almost 1/4, while a 30g yield would only be 10% lower than the avg.

It also helps a lot with the cooling to be running a lot less wattage.

Chloemobile · Nov 26, 2015

30 watts would definitely be easier to cool. These are 5 x 14.5watts 1500 lumens per, so I am over double your wattage. People are pretty consistently getting a gram per watt with LED. ( i have in the past with a bigger LED array with 3w chips) so I think you will definitely reach your goal and be able to cal this a success

My goal differs from yours a little bit, which is to get as much out of this space as possible since this is my only flowering space. These bulbs may not be the best answer for that. I will run them out however because I think it will be an interesting comparison with your 11 x 11 cab to see results from different LED off the shelf bulb wattages in the same space. Not a true comparison because of the different strains but should still offer some insight.

blynx · Nov 26, 2015

Chloemobile said:
30 watts would definitely be easier to cool. These are 5 x 14.5watts 1500 lumens per, so I am over double your wattage. People are pretty consistently getting a gram per watt with LED. ( i have in the past with a bigger LED array with 3w chips) so I think you will definitely reach your goal and be able to cal this a success

My goal differs from yours a little bit, which is to get as much out of this space as possible since this is my only flowering space. These bulbs may not be the best answer for that. I will run them out however because I think it will be an interesting comparison with your 11 x 11 cab to see results from different LED off the shelf bulb wattages in the same space. Not a true comparison because of the different strains but should still offer some insight.

What I've found over many runs in my 11" x 11" cab is that while I had an average of 33g, the variance was mostly due to strain difference.

Are you going to run only one plant each round in this cab? Are you going to run the same strain each round?

If the answer to either of those questions is no, then I think the best you can try to achieve is a high average yield while minimizing wattage due to the amount of variables each round.

If you are going to run a single plant of the same strain each round, then you can adjust the wattage each round to see how it affects the yield.

If you are going to run multiple plants and different strains then I'd recommend picking a wattage to try and doing several rounds to get an average yield, then adjust wattage if needed.

If I wanted to truly maximize my yield from my 11" x 11" cab, I would pick the highest yield I have gotten so far (Mob Boss 46g) and keep running that strain while adjusting wattage each round to find the lowest wattage while maximizing yield.

Chloemobile · Nov 26, 2015

I think benchmarking with one strain is definitely the best way to tune it. Then differences In yield can be chalked up to different strains. I definitely intend on running different strains but getting the light wattage figured out is my main priority right now. If I get the same yield from 70 vs 30 it's a no brainier but have to run the same strain a few times. This sativa though had been under 12/12 for more than two weeks now and hasn't shown a single pistil! Maybe not the best strain to do this with but I'll have to use what I've got!

Growing my own: Chloemobile's Micro Cab

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